By: Christopher King, Associate, Mountain View
Last month I again participated in the Volunteer Attorney Program (VAP) as part of a partnership of Fenwick & West LLP and other organizations with Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto. Volunteers taking part in the VAP assist local low-income clients with a range of issues, such as contracts, debt collection, and landlord-tenant disputes. Each volunteer is paired with a pre-screened client who is in need of legal assistance. More often than not, the issue is usually more complicated than we think. The clinic sees about thirty clients each month with the help of volunteer attorneys and law students. In every case, we provide legal advice, and in some cases, we are able to provide some brief service, like writing a demand letter or filling out a consumer complaint.
Client sessions involve extended inquiry into the factual details, followed by counseling about the possible options and associated risks. I often find that clients have an inaccurate understanding of the legal implications of their situations, and (accordingly) significant anxiety about the gravity of the potential outcomes. In many cases—e.g., debt collection—this anxiety is unwarranted, and the ability to explain the situation and allay the clients’ fears is one of the aspects of volunteering as part of the VAP that I’ve found particularly satisfying.
Christopher is an associate in the Intellectual Property practice group at Fenwick & West LLP. A graduate of Santa Clara University School of Law, Christopher focuses his practice on obtaining domestic and foreign patent rights, with an emphasis on the computer software field. He has prepared and prosecuted numerous patent applications in diverse technology areas such as machine learning, video analysis, cryptography and computer security, advertising statistics, geographical information systems, and social networking.
Follow via RSS
